What are landing pages and splash pages?

What are landing pages and splash pages?

Landing page vs splash page, which should you be using on your website and why. If you're like most web designers and marketers you've heard of what a splash page is and also what a landing page is, but do you know the difference? Over the years there has been an evolution is website design and how to optimize a website itself. You can do various things like add plenty of content, images, tags, titles, etc. But there is a broader thing out there when it comes to structuring your website such as landing pages and splash pages, and we're going to go over them in this discussion

What is a landing page exactly?
A landing page got it's name because it's where your traffic will essentially be landing when they get to your website. It is also referenced as a landing page when talking about backlink building because your link is aimed at the page and that's where people land when they click through. There are many reasons you could have a landing page on your website such as you have a new marketing campaign out and you're targeting a specific niche. You could make a custom landing page just for that campaign so your users come in and feel more comfortable knowing they're in ther right place. You could also use a landing page as a sort of place holder letting your traffic know that your website is under construction or being built and how to contact you in the meantime.



What exactly is a splash page?
A splash page is like an intermediate between your website and your visitors. It is the first thing your visitors see before gaining access to your content, services or products. It's similar to an introduction for websites like the site itself is stopping you from seeing what it has just to say Hi, which gets pretty annoying. If you plan on using a splash page on your website I have to stop you right there because I don't recommend this at all. There are many more negative things to do with splash pages than there are positive, and I'll list some below.

1. They are an old outdated tradition that should be left in the past for good reason, they're horrible. A while back they use to be a great thing to add to your website because it was like you're greeting every person that walks through your websites doors, but not they're just a nuisance and actually impact how your website works and ranks at the same time.
2. These splash pages usually don't offer anything in terms of content since they typically just have images on them with a greeting and some sort of flash animation or gif. The search engines actually hate splash pages because they are not user friendly. Sure they could easily be clicked to disappear, but you're stopping your traffic from viewing your pages and that's not what Google wants. Appease the search engine god that is Google and avoid using splash pages
3. The coding behind a splash page may actually mess up the indexing of your website and result in you gaining less traffic from Google, Yahoo! and Bing. And let's face it, if you're using splash pages and this is happening it's like you're shooting yourself in the foot when it comes to rankings lol.
4. The more time people are wasting on your precious splash page is less time they will invest on your website. And lets face it, most of the time when people see a splash page that can't be skipped we just hit the back button or close the tab completely. Even if there was an option to skip the splash page, it's still loading and you're making it more difficult for your visitors to get to your actual website. So how about we don't use that splash page you took 20 minutes to set up in order to greet your potential customers, ok?

In Conclusion:
Landing pages can be used for a variety of things but what I use them for is primarily pages that I want to rank in the search engines as well as pages I'm sending PPC traffic to. You can increase your conversions if people are clicking an ad which is specifically written out for your landing page. They click through, see your page is what it says and then they buy. As for splash pages they are outdated and should be avoided at all costs. They will only annoy your visitors because there is an extra step they have to take in order to get to your actual page. They should also be avoided because the search engines started hating them a while back and they serve no SEO benefit at all. Splash pages will actually harm your rankings if Google notices you're using them.



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Razzy